Shirley Murphy - Murphy_Shirley_Rousseau_Cat_Coming_Home_BookFi

He seemed intently fixed on the guest room, ignoring her—until he twitched an ear, in a friendly gesture, inviting her to move closer. She padded right up next to him; they sat in friendly silence watching Maudie shake a pillow into a fresh pillow slip. Kit was so sure David had returned that when she heard a man’s footsteps in the hall, she watched for him to appear.

Jared Colletto moved into the doorway, carrying a bulging gym bag atop two folded blankets. “I could have done that, Aunt Maudie,” he said softly, glancing at the sleeping child. “I had trouble finding the blankets—that garage is loaded. Where will you put it all?”

“Most of it will go in the new studio,” Maudie said. “Except some boxes of Martin’s and Caroline’s things that I couldn’t throw away.”

“Mementos?” he asked softly.

“Photographs, letters. Caroline’s personal papers. Some things I don’t know what to do with. Her sister has her business papers. She and I together dealt with the trust—Martin and Caroline and I had our trusts drawn up by the same attorney at the same time, just after they were married, trusts for Benny and for Caroline’s two children.”

Entering the room, Jared eased the blankets onto the dresser, set his duffel on the floor, then unfolded the blankets and spread them over the sheets on the freshly made bed. “It’s nice to be able to visit. I hope I don’t disturb Benny, moving into his space. I guess I’m not disturbing him now,” he said, grinning. “Does he always sleep so deeply?”

“Like a rock,” Maudie said. “As if this terrible ordeal has produced, instead of sleeplessness, a need to escape into sleep. At any rate,” she said, smiling, “it’s nice to have you here. Of course no one would have bothered us, but it’s nice to have your company. You’ve grown up a lot since my last trip to the village.”

Jared put his arm around her, giving her a hug. “I don’t want you to wait on me, I can do for myself.” He looked at her almost shyly. “If you don’t mind me in your kitchen, don’t mind me fixing my own breakfast.”

“You’re to make yourself at home, Jared. Help yourself to whatever you want. But what is it? Something’s bothering you.”

“It’s just … you’ll be careful, when I’m out? Now that I’m here, I feel responsible. You won’t answer the door until you know who’s there? You’ll keep your cell phone handy in your pocket?”

“Jared …”

“And you won’t let Benny play outside alone?” Jared sounded, Kit thought, as bossy as his mother. He said, “I’ll play ball with Benny when I get home from work or classes. The car lot isn’t far, just around the edge of the bay, a ten-minute drive. I’ll be glad when we’ve moved your things into the studio, when you can get your car in the garage, can come directly into the house.”

“Jared, this is silly. I promise I’m in no danger.”

He looked at Maudie, frowning. “You were in danger when that truck nearly hit you. And you mentioned to Mother something about boxes being shifted around in the garage? And a silent phone call where the line was open but no one spoke, and no caller ID on the screen?”

“I’m sure that was some glitch in the phone system, maybe one of those electronic political messages that didn’t go through. I wish I hadn’t told her those things, I should have known better, Carlene can get so excited. I’m sorry Benny mentioned the truck. Well,” she said, “you’re here and it’s nice to have you. I know I must be putting you out, but we’ll make it a good visit.” She smiled. “There’s some lemon pie. Shall I cut us each a slice?”

“Pie would be great, then I’d better get some sleep. My first class is at eight. Go on down, I’ll just hang up a couple of shirts.”

Maudie left the room, heading for the stairs, and in a minute the kitchen lights brightened as if she’d turned up the dimmer. Kit turned to look at the yellow tom. “Why did you follow us?”

His eyes looked deep into hers. “My name is Misto.”

“Are you with them, with those two in the motel who robbed and hurt that woman?”

“Would I tell you if I was?”

“I guess not,” she said, half wary, half amused.

“I came with him,” Misto said, cocking an ear toward the guest room where Jared was hauling underwear and books out of his duffel.

“With Jared? From Maudie’s sister’s house? You live with them?” Kit said, amazed.

Misto dropped his ears. “I wouldn’t live in that house.”

“What do you mean, then, that you came with Jared?”

“I came from the prison at Soledad. I hitched a ride when Jared and Kent visited their brother. I knew they were from this village.”

Kit looked at him, puzzled. “Why did you want to come here? What were you doing in the prison?” Soledad was where Lori went to visit her pa, where her pa was serving time for murder. “Didn’t they see you in their car?”

“It was a hot day. I banked on their putting the top down when they parked, the guards watch the parking lot pretty carefully. They did put it down, and when they returned I was hidden under a blanket behind the seat.”

“But what made you want to come here?” she repeated.

Misto smiled. “I knew about you three, I heard some of the prisoners talking.”

She felt as if her heart had stopped. “No one in prison would know about us.” But then she realized someone would know, there were prisoners in Soledad that she and Dulcie and Joe had helped send there, men they had followed and spied on and snitched on to the cops. Some of those men did know about them, or knew about cats like them.

“You lived there?” she said softly.

“I came there to the prison grounds two years ago. There are fields around Soledad; a lot of cats live there, feral cats, but not like us. There was no other like me, no other cat to talk to.”

“Lonely,” she said.

“I’ve lived a lot of places where I was lonely. Only once in a while have I come on another speaking cat. It was there in the prison yard that I heard two men talking about Molena Point and about the strange unnatural cats they’d found there.”

She didn’t like this, they didn’t need anyone talking about unnatural cats, telling where they were.

“The prison ferals live on the grounds and in the surrounding fields, but I hung out with the humans,” he said. “I was hungry to hear human talk. I followed the trustees who did the gardening, they talk a lot when they work together. I made friends with some, they liked to bring me food. One morning, two of them started swapping stories about strange cats that were more than cats. The redheaded one said he’d trapped speaking cats near this village. You can bet I hung around to hear more.”

“Tommie McCord,” she said softly. “The redheaded one. They did trap cats, he and his friends did, but we freed them.”

“They laughed about trapping them,” Misto said. “The redhead—McCord?—swore he and his partner had had them in a cage and had heard them talking. When he said, ‘Those cats are loose somewhere in the village,’ I knew I had to come here, I longed to find others like myself. It’s been a long time, so many years since I had other cats to talk to, since I parted from my wife and kits.”

“There is a band of speaking cats, wild in the hills. Those are the ones McCord and his friends trapped, they were going to sell them. That frightens me, that he’s telling people about us. But of course he would, wouldn’t he? Scum like that,” Kit said, hissing.

“Not to worry, the other prisoners didn’t believe him, they made jokes about him, called him crazy. Though later,” he said more solemnly, “I saw one of the men watching the feral cats in a puzzled way, watching too intently.